Tag Archives: SCO

Six Reasons Why SEO “Top Lists” Strategies Also Work for PR

Posted on September 7, 2011 by | 4 Comments

A thoughful campaign can trigger a waterfall of visibility.

Because the whole point of most public relations exercises is to generate visibility for specific messages, I like to draw ideas and tactics from the search engine optimization and marketing crowd. They’re a data driven bunch, and they have measuring outcomes down to an absolute art. At the same time, it’s no secret that the search engines – especially Google as of late – have been deploying big algorithmic changes with frequency. The ground under the feet of anyone with a stake in building online visibility has been shifting, sometimes uncomfortably.

One of the biggest changes recently was Google’s abrupt shut-down of real-time search. Google had been ingesting data feeds from Twitter, and using that data to inform search results. As a result, tweets (especially those from influentials) were featured prominently in search results. When Google shelved real-time, they stopped taking the data from Twitter, and while you can still find tweets in search results, the numbers of tweets featured seem to be fewer. And the real SEO value – meaning the ability to associate a specific web page with specific search terms, and achieve high rankings in search engines for said web page, when the aforementioned keywords are searched – seemed to be on the decline.

So, as you can imagine, I was pretty interested in a blog post from SEOMoz on Friday of last week, titled “Yes You Really Can Build Links on Twitter,” which offered suggestions for building links (i.e. relevant inbound links from one site to another that can help influence search engine rankings, and are a key piece of SEO strategy) and, not surprisingly, there are some great ideas for PR folks to add to their tactics. What’s really interesting, however, is that the tactics blend SEO, building social relationships, influencer targeting, social content optimization and smart content marketing.

One tactic I really liked that could have a ton of value for the PR set was a comprehensive approach to building and using those irrepressibly popular “top 5 whatever” lists. In the example given, SEOmoz imagines they represent a maker of snowboard equipment. Here are the steps they take to build a list of the “top 5 snowboarding stunts videos” to build search engine visibility:

  1. Start a conversation, and ask people what they think is the best snowboarding stunts video they’ve seen. Reach out to people who have shared snowboarding videos in the past, or have the word ‘snowboarding’ in their profiles. (Tip from SEOmoz: Follower Wonk is a great tool for this.)
  2. Once the best videos are identified, the next step is to ID the Twitter accounts associated with the videos.
  3. Create the content rolling up the videos – blog post, article, etc. – and then tweet at the “winners” and give them a badge they can display on their own blogs. (From the SEO perspective, this is the win – getting a link from a solid blog back to the your site.)

Why is this approach smart for PR? Let me count the ways.

  1. The initial step – inviting the community to suggest videos – starts building audience and attention for your message right out of the gate. Keep their interest with good follow-through, and you’re on your way to building lasting attention for your brand.
  2. Focusing on socially connected people – the type of folks who upload videos to YouTube and share links on social networks – can add a real degree of amplification to your messages, and even set the stage for a viral event.
  3. Personal interaction – from inviting contributions from the community to tweeting directly to the top 5 boarders selected – makes the brand feel approachable and human. People are more likely to friend a friendly brand. And that personal, positive interaction can also trigger a potent word-of-mouth effect.
  4. Content. Congratulations, you’ve just developed a nice piece of content that you can use myriad ways. Of course you’d Tweet it and share it on your other social channels. You could even issue a press release about it, pitch it to a handful of media, and add it to other communications, such as newsletters.
  5. The overall visibility, in search engines and social networks, this type of effort creates is really worthwhile. It’s fun, positive, social and lasting.
  6. It’s measurable, on a few different levels. You can measure search engine ranking for specific keywords, traffic to the product-related web page you link to in your blog post, mentions of and conversations around your brand, overall web site traffic, new followers/friends/subscribers, media mentions – the list goes on.

These types of one-output/lots of results projects are valuable and efficient, and are relevant for traditional and new media channels and a wide host of stakeholders. Have you used this tactic for your brand? We’d love to hear about it!

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

Image courtesy of Flickr user NeilsPhotography.

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Writing Lessons Learned From Social Media

Posted on August 29, 2011 by | 8 Comments

Like a good PR or elevator pitch, an effective tweet, Facebook status update or Google+ post is compelling, finely-crafted, tightly-edited and impossible to ignore.   Social networks are a great place to test messages and hone your writing to the sharpest of points.

I started to think about the relationship between the improvements in my writing – most noticeably, in my new found abilities to edit myself and tighten the screws on my own phrasing – and the corresponding growth and engagement of my audiences in social networks.   Simply put, if you pay attention to what you write, you’ll quickly learn what works – and what doesn’t – with your audience.   And there’s more to that equation than simply subject matter.  The structure of your missives – along with the language you select, will dictate the outcome.

Facebook:  Be interesting, and pithy

Among the friends and family I interact with on Facebook, descriptive posts that are slightly off-beat generate the most interest.   When I gabbled nonsensically on Facebook when our house was robbed recently, my rambling message received zero (!) responses.   Are my friends and family heartless?  No.  But like any other group, boring messages generate zero traction.

On PR Newswire’s Facebook page, the vibe is a little different.  The crowd there appreciates the content we curate for them, but before they will follow the links we suggest, they need to be sold on why doing so is worth their time.  I always take the time to give my take on why a link I’m suggesting to them is interesting or useful.   That said, brevity is important here, as well.   A rambling paragraph simply doesn’t work.

Twitter: Edit mercilessly. Less is definitely more.

On Twitter, my followers respond to short, crisp tweets.  Seventy characters or less seems to be the sweet spot, and those fifty characters have to sum up the value of the link I’m suggesting. When writing tweets, I challenge myself trim and tighten my messages, distilling the tweets as much as I can.  Here’s a look the most popular tweets (in terms of the number of time the link I attached was clicked) I’ve sent this summer.  As you can see, all are well under the 140 character/space limit:

  • With a single tweet, Lance Armstrong’s PR machine blunts ‘60 Minutes’ segment. (79 characters/spaces)  
  • Google shelves real-time, and my take on what it means for #PR (63 characters/spaces)
  • Fewer than a dozen companies rely on the web to meet disclosure. Here’s why: (77 characters/spaces)
  • Sharable content is the SEO king. (36 characters/spaces)
  • SEO is really public relations. (32 characters/spaces)

I’ve also found it’s helpful to allude to your own take on something you’re sharing, and that it’s entirely possible to do so with one word, or even simple punctuation.  Appending a word such as “Really?” is an easy way to convey skepticism or an element of personal disbelief.  Adding a simple exclamation point in brackets (!) mid-phrase is a brief way to express your surprise.

LinkedIn:  Give the people what they want, and be transparent

LinkedIn offers all sorts of opportunities for brands.  Some of the most valuable, in my experience representing PR Newswire, are found in the Answers and Groups sections, in which members pose and answer questions, and discuss industry issues.

It should go without saying that these discussions are not the place for the hard sell.  However, that doesn’t mean that someone representing a brand can’t interact with others while also positively promoting the brand.  The key is simple – give the people what they want, which most of the time is a straight answer.

I’ve found that directly answering a question – and being up front at the beginning that I work for PR Newswire – can be a great way to share information, start a dialogue, and even win business.    Often, company insiders are in the position to share unique insight or details about a service or industry that others following the conversation appreciate.  However, one must be careful to give the people what they want.  Listen to their questions, and give straight answers.  It’s about them, not you.

Applying the lessons learned:

I know my writing skills have improved since I became active on social networks and started tracking the results of our efforts in social networks on behalf of the PR Newswire brand.  In particular, I’ve noticed:

  • The language used in a post/tweet/update plays an important role in attracting audience attention (and response.)
  • The lessons in brevity, editing and interest learned in crafting effective social posts also translate to headline writing.
  • Relentless editing is an absolute requirement for effective writing. I’m now a merciless editor, with decreasing patience for extraneous language and superfluous ideas.
  • Format content for the wired reader: make it easy to scan and share. I make use of bullets and sub-heads to make content easy for readers to scan, and to highlight phrases that are easy to tweet.  Case in point: the phrase that started this bullet point is 71 characters, and would make a great tweet.  In fact, I think I’ll use it to promote this blog post later.
  • The more time you spend in social networks and the longer you observe what sort of content sparks conversation, the more finely tuned your own story-radar becomes.  It’s easier for me to spot interesting angles for blog posts and press releases now that I’ve spent so much time immersed in networks with my PR peers.

From a professional standpoint, involvement in social networks offers a bevy of opportunities, beyond improving one’s writing.   You can test messages and campaign concepts, floating messaging to your social audiences, and observing which reverberate, and which fall flat.   By listening to social conversations, you can start to zero in on not just the topics of interest to the group, but the very words that are more likely to attract and hold attention.   I would even argue that you can increase the stickiness and uptake of the messages you craft, as you start to spot – and highlight – tweetable ideas or concepts within the content you produce.

What have you learned from your experiences communicating in social networks?

Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Building Enthusiasm & SEO: A Worthy (and Measurable) Outcome for PR

Posted on August 16, 2011 by | 2 Comments

The hobbyist blog "Robbie's Kitchen" trumps big brands in search engine results.

Increasing buzz and positive sentiment around a product, concept or idea is nothing new to the field of public relations – at its core; PR is all about influencing opinions one way or another.  In today’s digital age, we’re able to more strongly tie influence to outcomes.  In the past, clip books measured the degree to which messages saturated media.  Sentiment analysis and the volumes of conversation in online channels take it a step further, indicating whether or not conversations with the desired tone are on the rise (or, conversely, dropping, depending upon the desired outcome.)  And we can take things a step further, by focusing on building and harnessing authentic enthusiasm.

From a search engine and social media standpoint, it feels to me that we’re finally coming full circle with respect to the power of user generated content and the interconnectedness of social networks.  In other words, building (and linking to) enthusiast content, and connecting that content with key audiences is fast becoming a very good idea.

There are a few reasons why this is the case, and I’ll start with search engines.  I’ve been musing on a series of blog posts appearing on SEOmoz earlier this month.  If you’re a frequent Googler, you’ve probably noticed the results you see “feel” different lately, as the big engine continues to tweak its algorithms. I’m not expert enough to quantify what I perceived as different on the SERPs (search engine results pages) my searches generate, but the folks over at SEOmoz are.    A recent blog post titled “A Theory About Google: Authenticity and Passion as Ranking Signals,” nailed it.

In the post, author and SEOmoz chief Rand Fishkin noted he’s “…been getting the sense that there’s something new in Google’s algorithm – a metric or set of metrics that looks for some form of authenticity in a site and passion in the content created on a page.”  Common traits of the sites he’s spotted in high in the SERPs that don’t seem to fit the profile of a traditionally optimized web site include:

  • The web site is often a small, personal or niche website and is a lengthier article or piece of prose, usually rich with images and well-formatted
  • There’s almost always a sense that the piece is less commercial and more personal than other results, particularly in commerce-focused queries
  • The result feels like it has no SEO whatsoever, often not even a focus on keyword targeting or on-page work. It almost seems to rank in spite of itself, or the lack of knowledge the author/creator has about the rankings process
  • It’s almost always interesting and enjoyable; like stumbling across a great independent shop in the midst of a big-brand retail district (emphasis mine.)

So, to boil this down, Fishkin is saying that Google is somehow managing to show honest and enthusiastic content that doesn’t tick the boxes on the usual criteria for high rank in search results.

This is good news for anyone who creates content, including public relations.

All around us are people who love, geek out on and are passionate about the topics our brands and organizations are promoting – even the most seemingly mundane.

To experiment, I searched a number of mundane terms that I don’t believe I’ve ever used.  I upped the ante by using my work, rather than home, computer, because I don’t do much non-work-related searching on that machine (important, because Google personalizes search results.) I also logged myself out of Google.

  • Search query:  “laundry tips stains”
  • Result: A link to “Robbie’s Kitchen,” a hobbyist blog, was ranked #4.
  • Search query: “vegan tips”
  • Result: The VeganHacker blog was number 6 in the results.
  • Search query: “hiring a CIO”
  • Result: A link to tech enthusiasts Scott Burkett’s blog was number 5 on the SERP.

These blogs all had strong competition from big brands and publishers. Yet all had managed to land “above the fold” placement in search results, ahead of some of the big names.   In my mind, this underscores the absolute requirement for brands to develop authentic voices – both in social networks, and in the content they produce.   All shared the characteristics Fishkin noted.

Ultimately, good content is appreciated by your audiences – it’s eagerly consumed and readily shared – facts which don’t go unnoticed by search engines.   And search engine rank – and the resulting qualified site traffic – are very measurable.

So, from a PR standpoint – and, let’s face it, from my standpoint as the person who’s coordinating a lot of public facing content for my own brand’s social presences – here’s what I’ve taken away as my imperatives:

  •  Enthusiasm is a key content requirement.
  • Redouble efforts to find the enthusiasts within my own company.  Good content needs a heavy dose of true love.
  • Continue to find and connect with passionate people outside the company.   Curating their content – along with my brand’s – and sharing that information with my audience provides value and creates goodwill.
  • Edit for interest.  This will be harder, because anyone who’s edited “corporate” messaging knows it can be horrifically dull and stilted.  I’m hereby holding my red pen to my heart and swearing I won’t approve boring stuff.

What tips would you add for amping up the enthusiasm factor in the content surrounding your brand?

Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Social Content Optimization & Dissemination Really Do Matter

Posted on July 26, 2011 by | 2 Comments

A map of Edelman's SCO process. Source: Edelman Digital

Optimizing and distributing content throughout social channels is the cornerstone of any social media, content marketing or brand publishing strategy.  Developing good content and then deploying it in multiple formats across a variety of networks is a proven way to reach known audiences (and find new ones) with a message.    And when done well, “social content optimization” (rapidly known by the abbreviation “SCO”) can trigger a viral sharing of the content, multiplying the audience for the message exponentially.

A blog post on David Armano’s Logic+Emotion blog caught my attention yesterday.  In it author Greg Lipman shared a presentation (and the image at the top of this page) describing Edelman’s SCO process, which marries SEO with the social layer, to ensure content the agency develops is relevant to audience needs and interests, is written in the vernacular that will resonate with the audience, is search engine friendly and widely shared online.  Lipman notes that Edelman considers search and social to be intertwined.  (I agree wholeheartedly, despite the ever changing nature of the social network and search engine landscapes.)

The Edelman process is one every communicator should review, because it includes multiple content formats and correctly gives each element – text, photo, video, graphic etc. – special consideration from planning to execution.  This is important, because different content types are weighted and treated differently by social networks and search engines, and generate different responses from audiences.  (Related reading:  Multimedia content generates more online views.)  Lipman offers some good advice and a terrific content strategy map.

For those who took one look at Lipman’s map and decided there’s way too much involved in SCO, Joe Chernov of Eloqua outlined the strong connections between public relations, social media and search last week in a blog post titled “Content Marketing as a Force Multiplier.”   In it he described six “compounding benefits” companies can derive from a content marketing program, noting that content drives PR and social media, feeds demand generation and creates sales opportunities, improves SEO and ultimately, begets more content.  The cumulative effect of mindfully integrating efforts across networks, platform and content formats can’t be denied.

At least, that’s what I think. This blog post originally started as an e-mail to some colleagues, to which a link to Armano’s post was attached, about revisiting some aspects of our own approach to content dissemination. What aspects of Lipman’s map caught your attention?

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Weaving Visual Cues into PR

Posted on July 21, 2011 by | 1 Comment

Yesterday PR Newswire hosted a webinar about visual PR featuring Lorrie Thomas, CEO of Web Marketing Therapy, and John O’Connell, senior public relations manager for HTNB Corp.  The topic was visual PR, and we discussed how weaving visuals into different communications can improve the results your PR efforts generate.  Lorrie and John went above and beyond the call of duty, providing an in-depth examination of a variety of tactics their organizations have used successfully.

As readers of this blog know, a recent PR Newswire analysis revealed that multimedia content generates better press release results than plain text content.  Across the board, press releases and other content with multimedia garners more online views, is shared more widely in social networks and has a longer shelf life than plain text content.

Lorrie kicked off the conversation with a number of examples, showing how thoroughly her firm weaves visuals into their online communications, and reminding listeners that visual cues can be as simple as a subtle hyperlink in a body of text, or as complex as a an collection of videos or an array of graphical elements on a web site.

Visuals are front and center on a Web Marketing Therapy client's media pages.

This screenshot of a web site they created for a client is a good example. Developed for a leading tax negotiation and mediation firm, the goal was to highlight the CEO’s thought leadership.  Web Marketing Therapy used visuals on the media page – including headshots and videos – to highlight the client’s expertise.  And instead of simple text links, the site design employed big, clickable buttons – a best practice that’s often overlooked.   Because media pages build trust factors with current and potential customers (in addition to serving interested journalists and bloggers) fully utilizing this area of a web site is important.

Lorrie offered a variety of tips for using visuals successfully in a communications program, including:

  • Include media contact information, and make it visible in all the multimedia elements – even photos and video.
  • Web surfers scan, they don’t read.  Use visual cues can get people to (and through) your message or site.
  • Embed search ready links in press releases.  Hyperlinks still serve a visual role, offering emphasis to readers and search engines.  Doing so delivers good user experience, gives the reader a visual cue, and can help boost search visibility. (How to embed anchor text hyperlinks in press releases.)

John showed us how his organization has generated interesting data through polling that the public relations department has used successfully to create infographics and generate media coverage.  As a result, John noted that his firm is able to compete effectively in the PR realm for a fraction of the cost of competitor ad spends.

An example of the infographics created by HNTB.

Media, industry association partners and bloggers have responded very well to the data HTNB can find and produce.  John noted many don’t have the staff, budgets for the type of polling HTNB does, despite the fact that they love credible data and numbers.  Using data-based infographics has enabled HTNB to present content in new – but still newsworthy – fashion.

John pointed out that data and infographics present a coverage opportunity.  The data that can be illustrated with a visual – in addition to the infographics your organization produces – can garner attention and gain coverage where plain text can’t.  John noted that while many blogs and smaller industry publications will pick up the graphics HTNB provides, larger publications like USA Today prefer to create their own, and to do so they need the underlying data.  Getting to know the graphics departments at key news outlets was a great tip he offered listeners.

John summarized the opportunity for PR pros when using visuals: find the sweet spot between the content creator, the data you have, and what your business needs – that intersection is your opportunity.

Listen to the archived webinar: Visual PR: Using Multimedia to Generate Results

Connect with the panelists:

Lorrie’s web sites: http://www.webmarketingtherapy.com  and http://www.lorriethomas.com

Follow Lorrie on Twitter: @webtherapist

John’s LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/john-o-connell/0/867/894
Follow John on Twitter: @johnoconnellkc

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Five Tips For Tweeting Press Releases & Other Content

Posted on July 14, 2011 by | 7 Comments

Twitter’s role in spreading news and information is undeniable – more than any other social network, Twitter was built for the relay of information.  The audience Twitter has attracted revels in the consumption and sharing of news, and as a result, Twitter is enmeshed in the workflows of many journalists, bloggers …. and PR professionals. However, there’s more to using Twitter to spread the word than simply writing one tweet.  Tactics that can help expand the audience for your message include:

  •  Tweet all the angles of the content to maximize interest in your message. Press releases, white papers, blog posts and case studies often contain multiple angles.  Find and tweet them all.   Additionally, if the content includes infographics, photos or video, you can tweet those separate elements.
  • Spread multiple tweets out over time, to expose the content to the broadest possible audience.  Remember that for many, Twitter is a real-time news service.  Timing matters.
  • Use correct and effective hashtags to make your content easy to find.  Take the time to research and identify (and then use!) the hashtags used by others when discussing the topic you’re tweeting.
  • Structure the content to be Twitter-friendly.  Encourage others to tweet your messages by offering plenty of ‘tweetable tidbits’ like bullet points and well-edited headings.
  • Encourage re-tweets (RTs) by keeping tweets short.  Pithy tweets are catchy, and leave plenty of room to accommodate others re-tweeting the message.

Tweet all the angles

Instead of simply tweeting a headline, find multiple angles, and tweet those.  By doing so, you’ll broaden the appeal of the content you’re promoting, by exposing different storylines to your audience.  An influential blogger might ignore one tweet, but find another that surfaces a different aspect to the story interesting.

  • Tweet the facts/findings/tips your content offers separately.
  • Turn quotes into @mentions. If the content contains quotes from people who are already on Twitter, paraphrase those quotes in a tweet, and include the quoted person’s Twitter handle. (E.g. “Don’t tweet headlines, tweet angles says @sarahskerik {link to story})
  • If you post related video to YouTube, or have an accompanying infographic, you can tweet those elements separately.

 

Spread your tweets out

While I’m not a fan of automating tweets, scheduling them does have its place.  Often, when I’m promoting a white paper or other content on Twitter, I’ll spend some time writing a series of tweets about the content (using my own “tweet all angles” tip,) and I’ll schedule them across a day or two.   Dumping all of the tweets into the stream at once would achieve little – the same people would see my series of tweets.  Spreading them out over time means I expose my messages to more people as they dip into and out of their Twitter streams.   Search engines also surface tweets, and they look for timeliness of the content.  Spreading tweets out – especially if they are all pointing to the same URL – can help give you a little lift in search results, too.

Use correct and effective hashtags

Hashtags make the sea of information on Twitter navigable – they are how information is organized on Twitter.  Using appropriate and relevant hashtags gives your audience one more means by which they can find your message. You can identify potential hashtags by searching Twitter for your topic, and then scanning tweets to see what hashtags are used.  It’s always wise vet specific hashtags by searching them to ensure your messages will be seen in the type of company you want to keep.

Structure the content to be Twitter friendly

I’ve offered advice on this topic previously, but it is worth repeating.  You can encourage others to tweet your content by making it easy and appealing to do so.  Tight headlines, a well-edited list of bullet points and interesting, pithy quotations will make your content easy (and interesting) for others to tweet.

Related reading: Writing a Tweetable Press Release

Suggested tweets:

I’m of two minds regarding suggesting language for others to tweet.   On the one hand, providing a little direction can help spread the exact message your organization wants to convey.  On the other hand, avid Twitterers like writing their own messages.  My conclusion:  Go ahead and offer language for suggested tweets.  Those who want to re-write the message will, while others may appreciate having the tweet written for them.

At the minimum, always provide relevant hashtags and a short URL for others to reference in their tweets.  And make sure the tweets you suggest are short and well-written!

There’s a decided art to writing a Tweet, however, requiring a fine balance between sparkling creativity, ruthless editing and a feel for the audience’s interest.   What other tips would you add to this list?

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Social Media, B2B Demand Generation & Storytelling

Posted on June 16, 2011 by | Leave a comment

Yesterday’s Ask the Experts Digital Webinar titled, ” Using Social Tools for B2B Storytelling & Demand Generation, hosted by Marketing Cloud, ” was an interesting and enlightening session.  I loved the mix of perspectives offered by the panel:

  •  Jay Baer, social media strategist, author of the Convince & Convert blog, and co-author of The Now Revolution, @jaybaer
  • Elizabeth Sosnow, managing director of Bliss PR, @elizabethsosnow
  • Adam Metz, VP of business development, Metz Consulting, and author of The Social Customer (Sept. 2011), @themetz

As the title suggests, the discussion focused on using content in social channels for demand generation.  Before they dove into tactics, however, the panel discussed some social media basics.

First and foremost, Adam noted that in order to be successful, marketers need to discover where your customers are, at the correct time of need.   The content you create and deploy needs to fit the customer’s context.   He suggested that you look for the “watering holes” where customers and prospects congregate.  Quora, Twitter, and LinkedIn groups are all places, for example, where people go to ask questions and seek opinions, and for many companies are ideal places to find prospective customers.    Reaching current customers may be a different exercise, especially depending upon your goals – whether those are cross-selling, new product promotion or retention.  Destination communities that provide a level of qualification are good places to start.

Adam suggested that a social assessment is a good first step.  Assess the social landscape.  Find out what keywords and hashtags indicate conversations germane to your products and services.   Learn where the nodes of discussion exist, and map out communities, forums and discussion groups that cater to more sophisticated and experienced customers.

LinkedIn was the next topic of conversation, and Elizabeth noted that B2B organizations really need to invest in this network, calling it a “sleeper,” and noting that it has a big audience that is focused on doing business.   Her advice for establishing yourself on LinkedIn as straightforward and effective:

  1. Establish and complete your personal profile, to take advantage of all the search capabilities
  2. Participate in some Q&As – search LinkedIn for two terms that matter to you, try to answer one or two a week.  You can get leads & prospects from this exercise, and raise your overall profile.
  3. Groups are still a great opportunity to harvest prospects and find influencers.  Pick 3 groups that look meaningful, and engage – not just sharing your stuff but interacting and learning.

The group agreed that the B2B sales cycle is a long process, and marketers need to keep that process in mind when it comes to influencing.  People like to be engaged as they make buying decisions, and social media, deployed wisely, can provide another level of appropriate engagement along the decision journey.

At this point we arrived at the meat of the conversation, and it was really interesting as the conversation turned to storytelling tactics, and how they can work in a B2B demand gen social strategy.

Elizabeth offered a few examples, including what she called the “David & Goliath” story, and the “Hannibal Lecter” story, which (surprisingly, I thought) really do have solid application in the B2B space.

In the “David & Goliath” approach, the storyteller frames the story in terms of a smaller player facing off against a larger player … or problem.  In the “Hannibal Lecter” approach, the writer finds a “bad guy” – preferably a process or other non-human impediment.

All of the speakers agreed that atomizing and distributing the content you produce is a key practice, noting that in many cases, when we post content to our own web sites, we’re serving people who already have some sense of the organizations we’re promoting.  The trick, the panel agreed, is to reach a larger group of people.

Decentralizing your content is one way to put “more bait in the water,” as Adam characterized it, noting that you can turn one white paper into five blog posts, a webinar, a slide deck, etc.  Break up the content and spread it widely.

Jay noted that the decentralization strategy does require some discipline, in the form a hub (probably the company blog) to which the other channels point.  All of the content you deploy needs to ultimately point readers back to a point (blog, microsite, landing page, etc.) within the brand’s control that effectively represents the next step in the customer’s decision.   Here’s the full presentation deck:

marketingcloudwebinarjune152011final3

If you’d like to access the webinar re-play, click the image at the top of this page.

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Do you know where your content is?

Posted on June 10, 2011 by | 2 Comments

A weird moment at a media relations workshop I attended yesterday left me feeling as though I had spun backward in time, to the late 90’s or thereabout, before Twitter was a gleam in anyone’s eye, to a time when newspapers still reigned supreme in the information universe.

Three prominent Chicago journalists admitted they didn’t use Twitter – not for research, nor for communication.

Several Chicago PR stalwarts noted their clients only cared about print and broadcast – none of “that internet stuff.”

I sat openmouthed in the back row upon hearing these comments, given in response to a question I asked about the extent to which journalists in the represented newsrooms used social networks to build audience for stories.  (I was told that most do, but these three big leaguers didn’t.)

The conversation devolved into the same one you hear at any meet-up of PR people and journalists.  The journos bemoaned long, irrelevant, attachment-riddled e-mail pitches with stupid subject lines squealing “Check this out!”   The PR pros said a little common courtesy, such as noting whether or not a pitch was received, would be nice.

I snapped my jaw shut and adopted a neutral demeanor when I saw that one of the panelists had noticed my bewildered expression.  But inside, I was really disappointed in the media pros and in the PR reps both, for ignoring  a medium that has become the preferred news source of many, and has fueled some of the biggest stories of the year, from the rise of the Arab Spring to the downfall of indiscreet politicians.

After the panel, one of the journalists sought me out, to double check a web site I had mentioned during the Q&A.  We chatted for a minute and I mentioned my surprise that he wasn’t using Twitter, which I went on to characterize as the most awesome personal newswire a person could imagine.   The journo said he had tried it but didn’t see the value.

I asked him if he had ever set up lists in Twitter, or seen Flipboard and Paper.li. When the answer was no, I told him the story of how I changed my husband’s life forever, by setting him up on Twitter,  creating a list of NFL draft prognosticators, and hooking that into Flipboard, producing a personalized, glossy, user-friendly and up to the minute news magazine focused on the recent draft.  When I handed my husband his iPad, his eyes grew wider and wider.  He sank onto the couch, flipping through the articles and blog posts.  He was thrilled by my 5-minute creation, and proceeded to gorge himself on the latest draft intelligence and speculation.

It’s important to understand how your audience is consuming information, especially if you aren’t familiar with or don’t prefer some of the content aggregation services out there.   Pulling out my iPad, I told the journalist “You need to see this,” and sat him down for a quick tour.

First, I showed him my Twitter feed, which really isn’t pretty, and described how I built lists of people who focused on particular subjects.

A screenshot from Hootsuite, showing a couple of my Twitter lists, including "SocialPRpeeps" - a list of social-media savvy PR pros.

Then, I showed him what that Twitter list looked like in Flipboard, showing him how links are rendered into article summaries, and presented in a glossy magazine format. I handed him my iPad.  Wide eyed, he flipped from page to page, looking at the articles my SocialPRpeeps list members had tweeted.

My SocialPRpeeps Twitter list, as viewed through Flipboard on an iPad. Flipboard renders the links people tweet, and presents the content in a reader-friendly format.

The ah-ha moment came when I showed him how elegantly Flipboard served up access to the articles on their native web sites.

The abstract of an article on Flipboard. Clicking on the arrow at the bottom of the page takes you directly to that piece.

Viewing the original version of the article in Flipboard.

We were both kind of stunned – him by the presentation of content he held in his hands, and me by the fact that a big time media guy didn’t know about Twitter lists, Flipboard, and the myriad other interesting ways people are accessing news content these days.

Moments like these make me fear for the future of journalism.  Readers crave content.  It’s easier and more convenient than ever to stay abreast of the news.  The question, of course, is how to sustain the business of news in this new and fast evolving environment.

Until that big question is answered, my own opinion is that communications pros have some key imperatives, including:

  • Driving ourselves to understand all the different ways people are collecting, reading and sharing news and information.
  • Educating our clients and the C-suite about the value of online visibility and the social layer
  • Help your peers become conversant and confident in social networks.  Gently lead colleagues who don’t use social media into this new communications fray, like I did with the aforementioned journalist.  Share your knowledge freely, because our colleagues need to know this stuff.  It will help them drive more readers to news articles and more results for clients – and this rising tide will help lift everyone’s boat.

I’m glad that journalist sought me out – I hope he takes what he saw back to the newsroom, where more media pros can ponder the new information landscape, and maybe dream up that new model journalism so desperately needs.  Anyone with a vested interest in communicating with audiences really does need to stay on top of how content is consumed.

Related reading:

Using Twitter for Media Relations

Social media press release distribution

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.  Follow her on Twitter: @sarahskerik

Read the article pictured in the blog post (it’s a good one!) here: http://prbreakfastclub.com/2011/06/10/whispergate/

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Making Messages Stick

Posted on May 3, 2011 by | 2 Comments

I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about the messages produced to support PR campaigns, and what can be done to make them work harder for us.  Along the way, I’ve looked into the changes in how content is consumed, how people process and retain information and what the underlying economics of the news business mean for PR pros.  I’ve synthesized some thoughts around making messages “stick” with audiences in a little video today.

And I’ve organized these thoughts under the Visual PR tag here on this blog.   I’m curious to know what tactics you think work best in creating lasting traction with audiences – please share!

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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Multimedia content drives better press release results

Posted on May 2, 2011 by | 100 Comments

PR Newswire press release results

A recent update to our web analytics program enables us to compare the copious data which details the activity press releases generate on PR Newswire.com.  We eagerly looked deeper into the  data, which revealed something we had suspected but can now confirm:  press releases that include multimedia elements generate more views.  In addition, the data offers insight into how people consume information online, and underscores the preference for multimedia content.

So why do multimedia releases get more results?    Our data reveals several reasons.

  • Multimedia content is more broadly distributed – because each element of a multimedia release is distributed separately, and can attract its own audience – in social networks, and on search engines.  Videos, for example, are distributed to more than 70 video-specific portals.    The effect of distribution is illustrated clearly in the stark contrast between traffic sources for text press releases versus traffic sources for multimedia content. Search engines are the primary drivers of traffic to text (“non-MNR”) press releases.  However, “other web sites” are the primary drivers of traffic to multimedia content.
  • Multimedia news releases content is shared much more enthusiastically on social networks.    This number is driven somewhat by the fact that multimedia press releases generally include a variety of “sharable” elements – photos, video, slides, etc. – in addition to text.  The wide distribution of these elements as described previously also plays a part in driving sharing. Nonetheless, the differences in the degree to which multimedia releases are shared more frequently than plain text is striking: across the one-month sample of content on PR Newswire.com, multimedia releases were shared 3.53 times more often than text releases.
    • Text releases were shared, on average, .99 times per hour per release
    • MNRs were shared, on average, 3.5 times per hour

(Note: Sharing data derived from ShareIt and Crowdfactory data from PR Newswire.com.  It is important to note that at the moment we are not capturing social sharing that occurs when a visitor copies a URL and shares it manually within these numbers.)

  • Multimedia content also has a longer “shelf-life,” holding the audiences’ interest for more than twice as long as text press releases.  On average, text press releases generate visibility for 9.4 days.  Multimedia press releases, on the other hand, generate visibility an average of 20 days. The higher degree of sharing also contributes to extending the message life.

Our “Visual PR” series of blog posts offers ideas and tips for incorporating visuals into your public relations messages.  Learn how to create video, utilize photo, create infographics and more by reading the Visual PR series of posts.

Ragan.com: Multimedia news releases grab 77 percent more views, report says

Learn more about visual PR, and using multimedia to differentiate, illustrate and enliven your messages.

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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